Godkiller Chapter Summary - 24 - The Tower

• Chapter begins late on the 20th of Spring, Annum 4466
• Our heroes had broken into the Devoost Cannery of inner Smog Town to find a gaggle of X-Model warforged synthesizing the same acid found in the bodies of the Warforged Rebels.
• The brawl was quick and brutal. Surprisingly, damage to the X-Model warforged revealed not acid, but an odd, black, magnetic liquid: Ferrofluid.
• Some of the warforged ditched their efforts to fight back, opting instead to try and destroy evidence strewn around the cannery.
• Upon defeating the warforged, a mass of crucial evidence was discovered.
  • The plans detailing the initial train robbery which had been completely staged. There hadn’t been a scrap of 1-5 Potentium on the train.
  • Ledgers, written in cypher, detailed acquisitions of 1-5 potentium going five years into the past. The total acquired metal doubled what The Guild had feared.
  • There were damning shipments of acid had been packed for the city of Rails.
  • A vault containing funds and spell scrolls for a quick escape.
  • Schematics for a 1-5 Potentium Bomb
  • One eerie wall was covered in evidence detailing more than a decade’s worth of seemingly unrelated Warforged Rebellions that resulted in various societal collapses all over The Three Corners. A conspiracy of enormous proportion if true.
  • This neatly paired with a folio detailing restricted Kerketh Academy research on “The Interconnectedness Principal”. The paper proved the existence of Diaphanous Magic passing back and forth between all Apparatum and Warforged. Warforged especially so. The diaphony supposedly causes unique interference preventing complex, multi-device interaction and hints there may be some unknown, potentially dangerous interaction between apparatum.
    • This, mixed with the eerie wall of evidence hinted at a grim conspiracy. What if the warforged terrorism is more coordinated that it seems? Or what if something is controlling the warforged, causing them to act erratically on its behalf?
    • The second half of the folio became more concerning. The individual behind all of this chaos in Tenzentak over the last week, had delved into the phenomena on their own and discovered something. A way to account for diaphanous interference, allowing for complex, multi-device communication. A massive revolution in the field of Artificery.
    • The nature of this discovery was too fundamental to trademark, purely academic in its merit rather than economic. Instead of sharing this discovery, it was kept hidden for personal gain. Its inventor used this method to create pseudo warforged. Three Low Automata, technically similar to Rozwald’s turrets, that work in tandem pretending to be a Warforged. Pretending to possess a soul without actually experiencing Mechanicum Immaculatum.
    • Psudeoforged, by both design and restriction, are quite simplistic. Only able to carry out three complex actions before catastrophic failure. Many tests had been tried with these Psudeoforged that found them capable of complex action, but unable to form abstract thought. They could even go as far as Rails, to harass a Lars Journin, and return to Tenzentak.
    • Their true designs had to be kept secret. This is why their creator needed the acid to melt away internals, masking their true nature.
  • A collection of clarifying letters were discovered, pulling the pieces into a cohesive picture. Rejection letters, all addressed to Guild Mind Master Colin Coinge. The artificer extraordinaire had petitioned dozens of manufacturers to trademark and commodify his invention. A failsafe precaution called The Fuse. This invention, the one Gideon Gain had warned Cyrus about, could change the way warforged exist forever. But every last manufacturer had all rejected him on bad business practice. Even Lord Rozwald, Coinge’s supposed colleague, had said: “People are scared of Warforged, but not this scared.”
  • Equally strange, this failsafe precaution wasn’t the same discovery as his sincerely brilliant, and world changing Psudeoforged design. This new design was of a completely different, morally reprehensible nature.
    • Colin Coinge had developed a photographic ferrication process that would allow him to tie a Warforged’s lifespan to a vessel of Ferrofluid that would slowly evaporate over a year. Any rouge warforged built with a fuse would turn to mundane iron in four seasons time at most. This trademarked process would mean every year, a warforged would need maintenance from a non-warforged or it would die. And Coilin Coinge would legally reap a percentage of profit from every single transaction made to build and sustain these “safe” warforged.
• Colin Coinge had invented not one, but two major developments in the field of artificery. Yet no one wanted anything to do with him. People saw his work as too dangerous to their economy. Not worth the risk. So Colin Coinge set to changing their minds. It took him years to plan it, and required him to throw his lot in with a mysterious, and likely dangerous group of mages at Kerketh Academy to gain their resources. Colin Coinge would make the world fear warforged as they should, even if it meant lying to them.
• Though his planning was not as thorough as it needed to be. His peers, Logician Yaddio, and a foul mouthed recluse on the other end of a broken span read had both made their concerns about Coinge’s plan clear. Claiming he was destined to fuck it up.
• And fuck it up he did. For our heroes had found the details for the final attack. A demolition of Belzan Tower during Lord Curtis Renaull’s Anti-Warforged Speech.
• Unfortunately, X12, Coinge’s right hand Warforged had found you just as this was discovered. The automaton carried a small 1-5 Potentium bomb to wipe all remaining evidence, and our heroes off The Three Corners.
• In a moment of pure, selfless heroism, Sherman rushed X12. Tackling the smaller warforged into The Cannery’s inner canal.
• Light, fire, and destruction tore through the small industrial building. And everything went dark.
• In the blackness, Rozwald found himself drifting through smoke. Amongst the emptiness, was the dying body of Egan Alzby, lying on the watery edge of a beach. He warned Rozwald. Telling him to run, to flee from him. Rozwald pleaded for clarification, but Egan couldn’t find the words. Before Rozwald could open his mouth again, a singular word, a command, forced its way into everyone’s mind: WAKE
• The word, like a spike through reality itself threw all of our heroes upright in bed. They had been taken to The Guild surgery, pumped full of healing alchemy on Old Abby’s dime, and watched over by Eddoch.
• Sherman was no where to be seen.
• Our heroes suddenly learned that the entire city was in disarray. Victory Day celebrations cancelled, riots in the streets, and Lord Curtis Renaull was about ten minutes from giving his speech.
• Our heroes left in a rush, not able to mourn their lost friend. Eddoch gave any help he could, and outed himself as a member of the Ikas Feather to you.
• Through the streets our champions ran towards the imposing silhouette of Belzan Tower. Perched on the edge of The Grand Nothing, adorned with flapping kites, and lined with filled balconies that looked down on the chaos below.
• Lord Curtis Renaull was giving his speech to a riotous, doomed crowd. In a stroke of genius, Magnus knew the people needed a reason to panic. But the distance was much to far for any normal man to interfere.
• Fortunately, Deimos is no normal man. The mutant climbed to the nearest roof, nocked an arrow, and scored a direct hit into the meat of Curtis Renaull’s arm at over 500ft away.
• The crowd exploded into panic, as The Street Dogs snuck into the back entrance of Belzan Tower to find rows and rows of empty Warforged containment units leading all the way to Colin Coinge himself. It all led to a standstill with Colin Coinge’s thumb hovering over a detonator.
• Far off in the city, the body of Sherman lay still. Forced between two rocks at the bottom of the canal, mere feet from The Grand Nothing’s Cliff.
• As the water rushed past the unmoving hero, someone appeared to him. An old mentor, Beophan. Sherman had not only avoided vaporization, but had survived the blast. However the event had left him paralyzed from the neck down.
• But everyone was still in danger.
• Pushing, fighting, raging against the cruelty of the world, Sherman’s horns thrust out, forcing his chin down sharply downwards and reconnecting his spine.
• Bursting from the canal, half singed, and fully determined Sherman sprinted to Belzan tower through streets lined with fear, protestors, and waiting Psudeoforged.
• Colin Coinge scorned you. His mission, too great, and important to fail. His confidence wavered when Mal blasted the detonator from his hand in a remarkable feat of skill. Before Coinge could scoop it up Sherman smashed through the window, all burnt metal and broken glass and stomped the device to pieces.
• But it hadn’t been a detonator at all. It was one of the spell scrolls from the vault. Colin Coinge’s way out. The reality of the situation was plain on the artificer’s face. Pure fear and spite. A warforged had doomed Colin Coinge.
• In a rage, Coinge threw every warforged containment lever, and screamed a single command. Kill.
• Over forty guild warforged rushed our heroes, who barely made it down corridor and hid behind a set of Apparatum Blast doors.
• There, in the center of the room, strapped to a column was a 1-5 potentium bomb.
• The heartbeats of our heroes, the sound of metal hands scraping against blast doors, and the deep wicked pounding inside Deimos’ head counted the seconds as time ran thinner and thinner.
• Rozwald had spent the last years of his life at the mercy of the world, unable to take hold of his things. But this… this he could do.
• As if it were as simple as lighting a pipe, Rozwald jammed the clockwork mechanism with only a second to spare. But the doom within Deimos’ head still built to a crescendo.
• In that piece of a moment, Deimos and Rozwald both realized it. This wasn’t the only bomb.
• The explosion ripped through the building. Blast doors, inches thick caved in like they were made of thin aluminum. A shockwave of blinding light stole everyone senses, and threw the party airborne.
• They were falling.
• Falling.
• Still falling.
• Colin Coinge had designed the tower to topple onto Cliffside Square, but through disarming a single explosive you botched the entire plan. Sending the tower, and everyone in it falling into The Grand Nothing.
• Our heroes fell. Plummeting into the void, thousands and thousands of feet deep.
• But this couldn’t be it, could it?
• Hope is a generous term, but you can’t help but think there must be some way out of this mess. This couldn’t have all been for nothing.
• Around you, victims, debris, and enormous pieces of tower tear through a sky filled with fire, and spiraling kites.
• And amongst it all, are warforged hell bent on killing you.
• Chapter end on the 21st of Spring, Victory Day, Eighteenth Bell, Annum 4466